TOLLWAY BACKERS' NEW FUEL

A group studying ways to ease traffic congestion in Lake County has a new message: Highways don't create that much growth.

In fact, the controversial extension of Route 53 through Lake County would generate far less population growth than previously estimated, according to the Lake County Transportation Project, a group funded by the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority and the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT).

The study, by Chicago-based consulting firm al Chalabi Group Ltd., predicts that the proposed $1.4-billion, 27-mile extension of Route 53 from Lake-Cook Road to the Wisconsin border would add about 27,500 new residents to Lake County by 2020.

That's less than half the total projected by the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission (NIPC), a Chicago-based planning agency. A 1997 NIPC study estimated that the tollway and other planned transportation projects would increase Lake County's population by about 60,000 over the next two decades.

While al Chalabi agreed with NIPC's overall conclusion, it said much of the growth would be driven not by the tollway extension, but by other road projects and expanded train service.

Mike Truppa of the Chicago-based Environmental Law and Policy Center, a not-for-profit advocacy group that opposes the tollway extension, criticized the study's "poorly documented methodology" and said its conclusions are an attempt to sway public opinion in favor of the project.

"It's ridiculous to say that adding a small amount of train service will have nearly the same impact on growth as adding a 25-mile, six-lane stretch of highway," said Mr. Truppa, adding that transit services were used in only 2% of Lake County trips in 1990.

IDOT's Carla Berroyer, bureau chief of urban program planning, said estimating the impact of each transportation initiative should help agencies make better planning decisions.

"This is not an exercise to try to justify construction of the tollway," she said. "It's to examine the impact of various transportation alternatives."

NIPC Assistant Director Jim Ford said the "methodology is consistent, and the results are in line with growth forecasts."